Mostly about my amusement

Tag: parenting (page 1 of 1)

I am SO taking the kids to see this movie

I have a little girl (and a boy) who will love the movie Brave. I’ll take them to see it almost as soon as it comes out.

Thanks to The Mary Sue for sharing this.

I’m one of 4 boys and have zero experience dealing with little girls. That’s why I can say it’s different for girls but I can’t really say why it’s different. I can explain it and I sure don’t understand it.

My girl is talented and smart. She picks up all sorts of crafts without any effort and loves making things. Lily is like that too and our girl often impresses us with her ability.

Yet I find I need to reinforce that a) she really is smart, and b) she can do anything. She sometimes lacks that confidence and needs to be told more so than her brother.

The boys in my family, including myself and my son, have always understood these things. We know we’re smart (by divine inference!) and we’re only limited by ourselves (read as I’m also lazy).

That’s good and it made for some really fun and colorful knock down fights discussions growing up. That’s my parents fault and is how I was made. I like it and wouldn’t change a thing.

Although as I get older I do find it more useful to keep those details inside. 🙂

But I’m not equipped to deal with the confidence issues that little girls have. I just don’t have the experience. But I’ll continue to work at it and more movies like Brave will help.

Now if only Disney doesn’t screw this up somehow; I’m still miffed that their new movie won’t be called “A Princess of Mars”.

One day limo driver

This morning Lily was going to head to LaGuardia airport and catch a plane to Detroit. I was going to head to the office at my regular time and put in a fully productive day at the office.

The person who was going to pick her up forgot.  I ended up getting dressed in record time and driving her to the airport.  She was running late and had to leave NOW.

She made the flight but it was close.  I headed back home and called my boss to apologize for the last minute change in my schedule.  If I headed to the office I’d have gotten into the city almost 2 hours late and I was not sure if I had any conference calls. I don’t like making changes to my work schedule all off a sudden. Do it too often and it’s abusive.

The day worked out but the high point was my being on a call with my 6 year old son stage whispering “Daddy, can I play with the Nintendo DS?” and me pantomiming the reply of “LEAVE NOW OR FACE THE AWESOME WRATH OF DAD”.  All this while replying to people on the call with “Sure, that change should work. Let’s do it Friday after hours”.

Sign language is a parenting tool.

With Lily not coming back until the evening, I had to bathe both kids.  I need to install a power washer; did you know that little girls need hair conditioner?  Boys are much easier. Ivory soap can double as shampoo and no one ever notices on a boy.

Later on it was her turn to play a game but she kept giving the game to her brother.  She also complained often that he’s not letting her play. This is a life lesson for my son: watch out for girls.  That she just gave him the game did not stop her from trying to get him in trouble.

I’m really glad Lily came back today.